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LOTUS NIELSEN
1925—1991
The Cause of Bahá’u’lláh owes its worldencompassing spread to the valiant and courageous pioneers who, in many cases, sacrificed everything to take Baha’u’llah’s healing Message to people in the most remote areas of the planet. One such pioneer was Lotus Grace Nielsen.
Lotus was born on 25 March 1925, the eldest of three children born to Grace and Oscar Petersen, a young Bahá’í couple in Duluth, Minnesota, USA. Grace, her brother Eldrid Bauers, and their mother Caroline Grace Bauers had all become Bahá’ís around 1916, Grace being the first in the family to accept the new Message.
Lotus grew up on a dairy farm on the outskirts of Duluth. She loved the farm animals and as a little girl would try to dress and bed the farm cats like dolls. Bahá’ís in the United States at that time were few in number, so travelling Bahá’ís would often Visit the friends living in fairly remote areas. Thus among the visitors to Lotus’s childhood home were Martha Root, Louis Gregory, Roy C. Wilhelm, and Victoria Bedikian.
The yearning to pioneer came at a very early age for Lotus. She first pioneered at the age of 17, moving with her mother to Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. When she was 21, she set out alone for Venezuela. However, the cultural shock proved too great for the young farm girl from Minnesota With an American/Swedish/German background, and Lotus returned home shortly after her arrival. She was heartbroken and felt like a failure as a pioneer.
THE BAHA’l WORLD
Back in Duluth, Lotus became known as an eloquent speaker and a talented writer. She was so active as a Bahá’í that a local newspaper referred to her as “leader of the Bahá’í Movement in Duluth”. She was frequently a delegate to the National Conventions, but pioneering was always first in her mind. She longed to heed the words of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá and to serve the beloved Guardian to her fullest.
Lotus soon moved to Fargo, North Dakota, as a home-front pioneer, then in 1952 she went to work at the National Bahá’í Office in Wilmette, Illinois, as a secretary. She was well—liked and efficient, but the yearning to pioneer could not be stilled. In 1954 she packed her bags and left for a pioneering post in Finland.
Lotus loved Finland. At first she rented a room in the house of an elderly non—Bahá’í couple who were very kind to her. Then, during a Bahá’í conference in Finland, Lotus met a young Bahá’í from Denmark, John Nielsen. They were married in 1955 and moved into the newly-acquired Ḥaẓíratu’l-Quds in Helsinki as caretakers. Lotus served on the Local Assembly of Helsinki and was later appointed to the Nordic Bahá’í Council (the forerunner of the Regional Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Scandinavia and Finland).
In August 1956, the Nielsens’ first child, Grace, was born, and in December of that year the family moved to Sweden. The social conditions and job opportunities in Sweden were better than in Finland, and Sweden needed pioneers as badly as its neighbour. In Sweden, J ohn and Lotus served on the Regional National Assembly for Scandinavia and F inland and on the Local Assembly of Stockholm. During their years in Sweden, the family grew from three to five, with the addition of Lisbeth and Patricia.
As in Finland, Lotus and John lived in Sweden’s National Bahá’í Centre. This was a very small house on the outskirts of Stockholm with one room set aside for meetings.
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In effect, however, the whole house was in use during any Bahá’í function and the Bahá’í Centre always seemed full of people. Many stayed overnight leaving the Nielsen family with little privacy, but each guest was welcomed. The children often found themselves sharing one bed because their parents had given their beds to some tired Visitors for the night.
In 1962, the Scandinavian countries elected their own National Spiritual Assemblies and Lotus and John were elected to the first National Spiritual Assembly of Sweden. Once activities in Sweden were well underway, Lotus’ restless pioneering sou1 started to stir again. J ohn liked the idea of moving to Greenland because it belonged to the Kingdom of Denmark, of Which J ohn was a native, and one of the two official languages spoken was Danish. Lotus liked the idea of an unfulfilled goal! Thus it came about that in early April 1966, after having bidden farewell to everyone, the family set out on its greatest adventure.
The goal for Greenland for the Nine Year Plan, which ended at Riḍván 1966, was to have one group in the capital, Nuuk (Godthab), and a Bahá’í in one other locality. When the Nielsens left Sweden, Bill Carr, a Canadian Bahá’í, was on the American Air Force Base in Thule as a civilian, and the first Greenlandic Bahá’í, Hendrik Olsen, was living in Sisimiut approximately 600 kilometres from Nuuk. Therefore, the Nielsens tried to get to Nuuk.
Travelling in Greenland at any time can be difficult as the weather is unpredictable, and in the mid-1960s Greenland Air only had three 20—seater Sikorsky S—61N helicopters for passenger transport. Lotus and her family were held up for three weeks in Kangerlussuaq (Sandie Stromfjord) before being able to travel on to Nuuk; they arrived just in time to fill the goal of the Nine Year Plan. They spent their first night in the home of J ohn’s new boss and his family.
A 36—square-metre house was waiting for them the next day, consisting of one larger
Lotus Nielsen
room, a very tiny bedroom, and a small kitchen with an electric stove and cold running water. There was no hot water, no bathroom(on1y a chemical toilet in the hallway), and no central heating (a kerosene stove in the larger room provided the only heat). The house was very poorly insulated and ice would collect on one wall in the tiny room where the children slept. A water truck came once a week to fill the house’s tank; the tank was made of iron and so the water always had a rust—red colour. The family often ran out of water before the truck came, so water had to be fetched from the nearest pumping house. The year spent in this house taxed Lotus’ health, and she developed migraine headaches from which she suffered for the rest of her life.
John worked as a truck and taxi driver until starting a small newspaper and working as its editor, writer, and printer with the help of the whole family. After several years, the paper was sold. Meanwhile, Lotus noticed that there was no furniture store in Nuuk so the Nielsens opened one in 1967. This was an instant success and grew to become the
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largest furniture store in the country, with a branch in another town. Persian carpets were sold too, imported through a Persian Bahá’í friend in Denmark.
The Lutheran church was very strong, and introducing a new religion turned out to be quite difficult. Much time and effort was spent on preparing the soil: praying and making friends. Because of the expense and difficulty of travelling to Greenland, Lotus and John did not see another adult Bahá’í for over two years, until Else Fynbo of Copenhagen went to Visit her sister who was married to the Viceroy of Greenland. Eventually, after 1968, more Bahá’ís came to Visit from Denmark, the United States, and Canada. The first believer of Nuuk declared in 1970: Else Boesen, a Danish nurse.
During the 19703, serious problems surfaced in the Nielsens’ marriage, and the couple divorced in 1975. Lotus, who had been a horne—maker during all her married years, had to find a way to support herself and her one child still living at home. She took over the furniture store, but eventually gave it up and purchased a small gift shop in Nuuk called the Arctic Gallery. Every year she Closed the store for Naw-Rúz and had an ad printed in the newspaper to publicize this event. The gift shop became a meeting point for the Bahá’ís and many on—the—spot firesides were held there. In order to make ends meet, Lotus also taught English at the local schools.
The first Local Spiritual Assembly in Greenland was formed in 1979. This was a maj or Victory for Lotus and the first goal on a very long road. In the early 1980s, she became the first Bahá’í in Greenland to be appointed an assistant to the Auxiliary Board, and a few years later became» the first member of the Auxiliary Board for Probagation.
Around 1986, Lotus felt that the community in Nuuk was firmly established and her pioneering spirit again started to stir. She knew that pioneers were needed to strengthen the Assembly in Sisimiut and to form one in Aasiaat if Greenland were to
THE BAHA’I WORLD
have its own National Assembly. It took courage and soul—searching to make the move. She was in her sixties, her children and grandchildren were all in Nuuk, she was living in a comfortable three—room apartment with all the amenities, and she had a well—paying job. Yet the establishment of the National Assembly for Greenland became the most important thing for Lotus during the last years of her life, so in 1988 she sold or gave away many of her belongings, packed the rest in a container for sending, and went 600 kilometres north to an uncertain future.
She first settled in Sisimiut where she rented a room in the home of Wendy and Carsten Lind, a pioneer couple. In Sisimiut she assisted the friends in many ways, from arranging meetings to babysitting. By 1990 Lotus felt the Sisimiut community was doing fine and that her services were more in demand in Aasiaat. She again packed all her things and headed north.
In Aasiaat she rented a couple of small rooms in the home of a Bahá’í couple, Marie and Ravi Butalia, until she managed to get a nice apartment which belonged to the hospital. The only problem was that the hospital needed the apartment during the summer months for temporary staff. Thus, when summer came, Lotus packed up most of her belongings but left Bahá’í books standing, and found on her return that the books had been opened and presumably read. In both Sisimiut and Aasiaat, Lotus supplemented her meagre pension by teaching English, babysitting, cleaning house, and doing other odd jobs.
Lotus’ health began to deteriorate and in the summer of 1991 she went into the hospital in Nuuk for an operation. The doctors suspected cancer and performed another operation but after it Lotus slipped into a coma. During her last days her family and friends took turns sitting by her bedside and caring for her. Their steadfastness and gentle acceptance of the inevitable impressed the hospital staff, and quite a bit of teaching
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took p1ace. Some of Lotus’ last words to one of her daughters, upon hearing of new teaching Victories in Aasiaat, were: “Now we will get our National Assembly! ”
Lotus passed away peacefully on 25 October 1991, and had the honour of being the first person to have a Bahá’í funeral in Greenland. Prayers were said in Greenlandic, English, and Danish, and the message of the Universal House of Justice was read in all three languages. More than 100 people attended the funeral, and her passing was mentioned on the national radio. She was laid to rest in the cemetery in the old part of town, a very beautiful spot overlooking the hills and the fjord.
The following spring, Lotus’ dream of an independent National Assembly for Greenland became a reality. This first convention was a major event for the Bahá’í community and was blessed With the presence of the Hand of the Cause of God ‘Ali—Muhammad Varqé. Dr. Varqa honoured Lotus and her family by Visiting her resting place.
A happy, energetic person with a distinct sense of humour, Lotus was always 1ooking for ways to promote the Cause. Her hospitality was legendary, her home always immaculate and ready to receive any number of guests willing to hear about Baha’u’llah. Honesty, truthfulness, and loyalty were some of her strongest characteristics. She had courage, determination, patience, and complete faith in Baha’u’llah.
The Universal House of Justice sent the following message on 27 October 1991, upon hearing of her passing:
We are deeply grieved by the news of the passing of the dearly 1oved maidservant Of Baha’u’llah and valiant promoter of His Faith, Lotus Nielsen. Her persevering, highly valued services to the Cause of God over so many years in North America and Scandinavia have been crowned by her Vital contribution to the raising up of the Bahá’í community of Greenland as pioneer and member of the Auxiliary
Board, and have earned her an undying place in the annals of that greatly promising community. We extend our loving sympathy to the members of her family and t0 the entire Greenlandic Bahá’í community, and shall pray at the Sacred Threshold for the progress of her radiant soul in all the worlds of God.
GRACE J. NIELSEN
